--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Welcome to Today Explained. I'm Sean Rameswaram.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: There's a lot of stuff in Donald Trump's one big, beautiful bill, but if you were looking for the biggest game changer in the way our federal government functions, you'd probably want to focus on ICE. The bill, as approved by Congress, provides $175 billion U.S. dollars for immigration enforcement. That is more money than most countries spend on their entire militaries in a year. In fact, that is more money than every country on Earth except the United States and China spends on its military in a year.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: And unlike, say, no tax on tips, people really hate ICE. Their agents were met by protesters in Washington, D.C. last night. People showed up outside Alligator Alcatraz to protest this weekend. Shut it down. And down in Southern California, soccer moms are showing up to harass ICE agents. You're going to hear from one of them on Today Explained from Vox.
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--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Support for Today Explained comes from BetterHelp. Let me tell you a true story. Last weekend, I got an email from a listener who wanted to discuss their problems with me. And I said, look, I don't think that this is about me personally. At least I hope it's not. Why don't you try BetterHelp.com slash Explained? Absolute truth. As the largest online therapy provider in the world, BetterHelp can provide access to mental health professionals with a diverse variety of expertise. Find the one with BetterHelp. The one is not me, guys. Our listeners get 10% off their first month at BetterHelp.com slash explain. That's BetterHelp.com slash explain.
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--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Estar escuchando a Hoy Explicado. Today, explain. My name is Angelica Vargas, but I would like to be identified as Angie Vargas. I'm a mental health specialist. I work with children, with youth 11 through 17. And I'm just a basic soccer mom. I love going shopping, going outdoors with my kids. You know, I love going to the beach. Typical mom stuff. So I live in Paramount, California, and ICE federal agents have been stationed here in the city of Paramount. They have a whole facility that they use to operate out of.
--:-- Angie Vargas: I just use my voice as much as I can to try and, you know, stop these ICE agents from detaining undocumented people. I have a genuine question. Why are you so fucking stupid? A lot of the immigration ICE raids started here in Paramount. I think the first immigration ICE raid took place right across the street from that facility at the Home Depot. That's where my journey began with my sister. My sister is a real estate agent, and she's remodeling one of her properties, and she was picking up a couple of materials. They were tear-gassing people, and so my sister got scared. She went back into her car, and then she wasn't allowed to leave the premises.
--:-- Angie Vargas: So then things escalated. People started showing up. The Trump administration ups the ante on its mass deportation efforts. Hey, what happened to you, bro? They shot you in the head? You all right? And after getting to my sister, I had to convince federal agents to allow her to get out of her car because she was stuck in the crossfire where they were tear gassing and shooting rubber bullets at protesters. Pretty intense situation taking place right now in Paramount. What started as a raid has now gotten out of control. Immigration enforcement operation. See, people are squaring off. There's a helicopter right above us. They are giving people a warning to disperse.
--:-- Angie Vargas: So I was arguing a little bit back and forth. And, you know, like after probably like three minutes, they finally gave in. So, you know, they were like, reverse the truck. We give you about a minute to get out of here. So I was like, all right, say less. So I grabbed the car and, you know, reversed, asked protesters to move out of the way. And we were out of there. I think the fact that I was there and I seen everything, it really moved me. It really opened up my heart and seeing how privileged that I am, you know, to be a U.S. citizen. And it just gave me this power to continue to do good for the community and stick up for people.
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--:-- Angie Vargas: ICE agents in the city of Paramount, on Paramount Boulevard and Student Gray, please get the word out to your loved ones. What I'm posting is basically federal agents detaining people from the Latino community, basically preying on the undocumented. You have to be understanding, please, that we need to provide for everybody's safety. I agree. I agree. But I'm just trying to help them, their families be aware that they're, you know, they're okay and that they're being taken care of. I get that there's always two sides of the stories. And sometimes, you know, these agents were with different task force and they're being called out to do this kind of job. But, I mean, if I have to go out there and try to give them a hard time for, you know, taking people in, then it is what it is.
--:-- Angie Vargas: Are you blocking me? Are you trying to block a U.S. citizen from going to her point of destination? Is that what you guys are doing? I think the most popular video that everyone loves and enjoys is the way that I go on ice dates with ice agents. It ICE here in Luxor They blocking me from moving on because they know I following them It ICE It ICE They blocking me It ICE The way that we go on a carpool together, I think that's what people enjoy. The way that they try to get away from me. They're trying to isolate me. They're trying to isolate me and fucking smother me.
--:-- Angie Vargas: So basically, when I get an alert that federal agents are near my city, You know, I'm like, okay, hey, let's go, let's go look for them, because they're looking for our people. So then I go, I spot them out, and then I just follow them, because, you know, I want to document what's going on. So I follow them, and it doesn't look like they enjoy it. They're the officers right here. I'm sure they have families, so here's their faces. No, I have a right. I have a right to record. I do. Yes. Gladly, I have a fast car, so I'm able to keep up with them, and, you know, we go on a car ride, and it's just, they basically chase agents around. They're not going to fucking corner me. They think they're going to corner me, but they're not going to fucking corner me.
--:-- Angie Vargas: They mess with the wrong soccer mom. Please get the word out. The ICE is out here in Paramount. I know they were at IHOP in the car wash. They're all pretty memorable. They're all pretty different. They all pretty much have the same outcome. This is another vehicle. Which is, they all try to lose me on the street. It's ICE, La Migra, La Migra. Some of them have even gone down the freeways. And we've gone down multiple freeways together. It's ICE, that's ICE, that's ICE right here. That's ice. Let your family know. That's ice. But one in particular that I wish I still had documentation of is there was probably like four cars that were trying to block me. And they split ways to try and lose me. And I ended up continuing to follow one. And it was a white truck of this big agent. So what he ended up doing was going on a railroad track because he knows I have a Mercedes. And, you know, it wouldn't it wouldn't be a good idea for me to go on the railroad track. So he went in the railroad tracks, try to get out of the railroad tracks through the other end of the street. But by the time he was trying to get out of that street, I was already there waiting for him because, mind you, my car's pretty fast. And I put it on super plus sports mode.
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--:-- Angie Vargas: A big old guy, you know, built and everything, but running from a girl, yeah, in a Mercedes. And I've had you know people from multiple generations, you know, approach me and tell me thank you, Angie. Like this makes me feel so much better. Like you don't know how much my grandma enjoys your videos. She laughs at them, you know, like it brings her joy because she's right now, you know, basically quarantined in the house. She can't leave the house because of her immigration status. And just knowing that there's someone out there giving them a hard time really brings her joy.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Are you ever scared doing this? I mean, these ICE agents are famous for arresting people and sorting out the rest later. They're profiling people. They're not asking a lot of questions before they make these arrests on their raids. And they just got supercharged by tens of billions of dollars of funding from the federal government. Are you worried for your own safety? As you said multiple times, you're a soccer mom. You got a family.
--:-- Angie Vargas: Yes, I am not scared because I'm not doing anything illegally. I'm just following them to document what they're doing. And if they're afraid of me documenting what I'm doing, then, you know, that's something that they're doing wrong. So, no, I'm not afraid. I guess I'm a big God believer, so that's why I am really not afraid because all this willpower is coming from him and this courage that I carry, it's coming from him as well. So as long as I know that I'm not doing anything wrong or anything illegal, I'm going to continue to not be afraid.
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--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Of course, I've had threads of trolls sent to me where they're recommending for them to disappear me. But like I said, I'm not afraid because I'm not doing anything illegal. And at the end of the day, I know that those are just bogus threats. If they want to come find me, people, you know, that are really concerned, they'd be here at my doorstep already.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Angie Vargas, soccer mom, Paramount, California. You can follow her on TikTok at Angie Vargas. That's Angie with three A's.
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--:-- Sean Rameswaram: When we're back on Today Explained, we're going to hear more about the mind-bogglingly blank check Congress just wrote ICE. Support for Today Explained comes from Built Rewards.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: These days, it seems like everybody has a rewards program. You swipe your card and you get one cent on the hundred dollars. But with your rent, frequently, you just pay month after month. You never get anything from it other than that roof over your head. Not anymore, says Built Rewards. Built Rewards says it lets you earn points on your rent. By paying rent through Built, they say you can earn flexible points that can be redeemed toward hundreds of hotels and airlines, perhaps a future rent payment, your next Lyft ride, and so much more.
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--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Support for Today Explained comes from Upwork. If you run a business, you know that scaling your business requires the right expertise at the right time. I sometimes wonder how many of you are running businesses out there. I would love to know. Please email me, noelle at king dot com. With Upwork, you can find specialized freelancers in IT, web development, AI, design, admin support, marketing, and more. Experts who they say are ready to help you take your business to the next level.
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--:-- Sean Rameswaram: That is Upwork.com, Upwork.com.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Today Explained, Sean Rameswaram for I'm here with Caitlin Dickerson, staff writer for The Atlantic.
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--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: Caitlin, your latest piece is titled ICE's Mind-Bogglingly Massive Blank Check. How mind-bogglingly massive is it?
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: It's very mind-boggling, especially because since at least 2012, the United States was spending more money on immigration enforcement than on all of our other federal law enforcement endeavors combined. So the FBI, the DEA, the Secret Service, and budgets have steadily gone up since then. And yet the increase in funds that ICE and immigration enforcement in general got under the one big beautiful bill act blows all those other increases and previous figures out of the water. Was ICE even asking for that much money? Do we know?
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: Absolutely. They were. The thing that people should know about that is that this is an agency that has a long history of fiscal mismanagement, and it's been called out for that by Democrats and Republicans consistently over the years. Can you elaborate on how these funds were directly misused and what measures can be implemented to trace and prevent further misuse of public funds?
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: You know, it's been said that ICE flagrantly mismanages its budget, that it almost intentionally sometimes seems to misrepresent the amount of money that it needs and also the amount of money that it's going to spend. And despite all that, they have completely acquiesced to the agency's wishes and allotted tons more money as well to CBP, which works at the border, another agency that has a history of financial mismanagement, and then these new projects. So expanding technology really dramatically, finishing building the wall that started under President Trump's first term, expanding the courts and more.
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: The highest profile thing we've seen so far in ICE getting this sort of windfall of cash from Congress is recruitment because high-profile people like D-list celebrity Dean Cain, formerly Superman from the 90s TV show, are offering to join ICE maybe on the House. But how is ICE going to recruit and how challenging will recruitment be?
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: It's going to be hard. So ICE right now has about 7,000 agents carrying out arrests on the ground every day. They want to add 10,000 more, so obviously more than doubling their workforce. And this is an agency that historically has had a really hard time getting people to come on board as well as keeping them when they get there. I mean, I've heard for years from ICE agents who say they don't tell their neighbors what they do for a living because it's upsetting to people, even in conservative parts of the country, areas that support immigration enforcement in general.
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: The story becomes very different when you're standing in front of someone in your community who's arresting another person in your community who you may know, whether it's because they work at a restaurant that you like to go to. They go to church with you. Their kids go to school with your kids. People get upset. And so they're offering $10,000 signing bonuses for lots of new agents, up to $50,000 signing bonuses for previous agents who'd be willing to come back to the agency. That's a really eye-popping number.
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: I mean, you know, I think it also will probably give taxpayers a bit of pause, given how many really important programs were cut in order to fund this money toward ICE. But I think even with all that extra money, it's still going to be an uphill battle because all of those controversial aspects of the job have existed for many years.
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: OK, so future and maybe even past ICE agents stand to receive a hefty payday. Who else is going to get paid because of this windfall? Two groups really significantly stand to gain here. So it's the private prison industry and the technology industry.
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: You know, historically, the most people we'd ever had in immigration detention on a given day was between 40 and 45,000. They want to get us to more than 100,000 people detained on a regular basis in the immigration detention system. So that means new prisons going up, whether they're being built from the ground up or they're refabricated former jails or prisons that have gone out of use and will be adjusted to serve for immigration detention.
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: A massive new tent camp is coming to Fort Bliss, Texas. The government has just handed out a $1.26 billion contract to build what will be the largest immigration detention facility in the U.S. with 5,000 beds. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem says Florida's alligator Alcatraz will serve as a model for state-run migrant detention centers. The next confirmed ICE detention center is in Indiana, it being dubbed the Speedway Slammer.
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: The private prison industry expected to make a lot of money as soon as Trump was elected and their suspicions were well-founded, it turns out. So, GEO and CoreCivic are the two companies that dominate immigration detention. You saw the stock prices of GEO and CoreCivic soar. Chairs of GeoGroup and CoreCivic rose more than 50 percent since the election.
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: The private prison companies say they're ready to detain more undocumented immigrants. The GeoGroup was built for this unique moment in our company's country's history. Their CEOs in calls with investors talked about an unprecedented opportunity to make money. And they actually started investing tens of millions of dollars in getting ready to expand the detention system before they signed a single new contract because they were so confident.
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: That confidence bears out in that the bill allots $45 billion to expand the immigration detention system. And the other space where lots of expansion is expected is technology. So ICE and the Border Patrol, CBP, are really moving toward facial recognition technology, surveillance, working with companies like Palantir to pull together information and create these interactive, almost real-time dossiers tracking immigrants and their movements using their financial records, their social media, but also privacy advocates say likely Americans.
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: You know, when you're scooping up that much data on people, you're going to get information on even those who you aren't targeting directly. So it raises a lot of questions about what's going to happen with these stockpiles of information. I argue that undocumented immigrants really actually aren't difficult to find in the United States. And so I question the need for this complex, almost spyware technology to track them down, which the administration supposedly would like to do.
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: How much oversight is there going to be of how this massive sum of money is spent? Is Congress going to be keeping a close eye on what ICE does with tens upon tens of billions of dollars?
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: The opposite of a close eye is what Congress appears to be keeping here. So there is no oversight at all built into the immigration enforcement aspects of the One Big Beautiful Bill. Another part of context that's important is that the administration had just previously gutted two oversight offices that existed within DHS, its Office of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, and then an ombudsman's office that oversaw, among other things, the detention system. Both of those are functionally no longer existent.
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: And so there is no oversight that we can see on paper, you know, this massive infusion of cash and no clear body looking to make sure that it goes to the right places, that it's not mismanaged or misdirected, and that it's not wasted.
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: Okay. So given that there is so little oversight built into this funding, If Americans, say, have buyer's remorse by, say, 2028 and they vote in a different president with a radically different way to approach immigration enforcement, can some of this be undone? Can you get back billions of dollars that have already been rewarded to private prison contractors or Palantir or whomever?
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: We will not likely be able to get that money back. If you look historically at the budgets of these agencies that participate in immigration enforcement starting around 9-11 when their work ramped up really dramatically, you find almost no dips at all whatsoever. One of the reasons is that with detention in particular, you're talking about opening new facilities, which means a lot of jobs. And communities really vie for these facilities.
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: Lots of immigration detention centers go up in rural areas where there isn't a lot of other economic opportunity because land is cheap. And the communities come to rely on the positions that these facilities create. It becomes a political problem for local officials to lose that money and lose that income.
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: So that's just one reason why it becomes hard to decrease funds, whether it's private prisons or the contractors that operate within them or the technology industry. You have aggressive lobbying that takes place. You have relationships that form and grow between government and contractors. And so we're not likely to see these budgets go down really significantly short of something unprecedented in a future administration because things just tend to increase over time.
--:-- Caitlin Dickerson: So it really is a wait and see.
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--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Caitlin Dickerson, TheAtlantic.com.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: Devin Schwartz produced the program today. Jolie Myers edited. Laura Bullard was on Facts. Andrea Kristinsdottir and Patrick Boyd were on Sound. Heidi Mawagdi, Gabrielle Burr-Bay, Avishai Artsy, Denise Guerra, Peter Balanon-Rosen, Rebecca Ibarra, and Miles Bryan also make the show. Amina Alsadi is our supervising editor. Miranda Kennedy is our executive producer. And Noelle King is our weapons. Breakmaster Cylinder provides music. Today Explained is distributed by WNYC. The show is a part of the Vox Media Podcast Network, and you can hear more of our shows that win awards at podcasts.voxmedia.com. Read all about it.
--:-- Sean Rameswaram: brings all the ways you use money into a single product that feels extraordinary to use. Visit mercury.com to join over 200,000 entrepreneurs who use Mercury to do more for their business. Mercury. Banking that does more.
